Badminton: England defeated

ENGLAND lost their second match, to Indonesia in the Sudirman Cup team event yesterday, writes James Leigh. They now have to contest a relegation play-off against Sweden tomorrow to decide who remains in Group One in the 7-Up World Championships at the National Indoor Arena in Birmingham.

They fell to a 5-0 loss to a powerful squad whose second team would probably have been good enough to beat them - although this was a better effort than the 5-0 walloping by Denmark on Tuesday.

Simon Archer, 19, and Joanne Wright, 20, played excellently in the opening mixed doubles, leading 12-7 in the first game and saving six match points in the second before losing 15-13, 15-9 to one of the world's top half- dozen pairs, Aryono Miranat and Eliza Resiana.

Anders Nielsen played many sprited high-speed rallies against the All-England champion, Heryanto Arbi, and forced him to many of his jumping smashes and airborne round- the-head drops in the 15-12, 15-10 loss. In the third contest, however, in which Minarti Timur beat Fiona Smith 11-4, 11-4, England were outplayed.

Smith is a triple Commonwealth gold medallist but her energies are reduced these days by the need to look after her two- year-old son Oliver, and she found it hard to stay with the pace of an experienced full-time circuit player like Timur. England now have to raise themselves against Sweden if they are not to return to Group Two.